Dynamic allocation and assignment of virtual environment

ABSTRACT

A mechanism for enabling enterprise data centers to allocate portions of their infrastructure and assign them to specific line of business unit IT organizations. The mechanism allows the business unit to dynamically and rapidly provision virtual infrastructure as needed to run line of business applications. This can also enable the business unit to focus more on the development and management of the applications rather than invest significant resources in managing the infrastructure layer. In various embodiments, data center administrators may be enabled to allocate and assign a portion of their physical infrastructure (Storage, Network and Compute) and expose them as a virtualized environment to different business unit organizations.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No.12/917,352, filed Nov. 1, 2010, now U.S. Pat. No. 8,924,964, issued Dec.30, 2014, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein byreference.

BACKGROUND

Information technology (IT) organizations of many enterprises arecontinuing to move toward centralization and consolidation of theircomputing resources within datacenters as bandwidth is becoming moreabundant, the cost of hardware has declining, and the density ofcomputing has increased dramatically at all levels—chip, rack anddatacenter. The number of specialized Line of Business (LOB)applications and services continue to increase significantly within ITorganizations. At the same time, people and process related costscontinue to spiral upward. Furthermore, recent regulatory requirementshave mandated much tighter governance over corporate data. As a resultof these competing pressures, the majority of IT organizations areincreasing the capacity of their data centers, collapsing branch officeservers back into the data centers, implementing tighter centralizedcontrol over critical data and applications, and automating theoperations of the data center.

One increasingly popular form of networking used by enterprises maygenerally be referred to as remote presentation systems, which can useprotocols such as Remote Desktop Protocol (remote presentation) to sharea desktop and other applications executing on a server with a remoteclient. Such computing systems typically transmit the keyboard pressesand mouse clicks or selections from the client to the server, relayingthe screen updates back in the other direction over a networkconnection. As such, the user has the experience as if his or hermachine is operating entirely locally, when in reality the client deviceis only sent screenshots of the desktop or applications as they appearon the server side.

Some enterprises that provide virtual machines to their users arepurchasing computing capacity from public cloud providers. The cloudproviders may use virtualization hosts to deploy virtual machines andsell virtual machines to the enterprise tenants. The virtualizationhosts in the enterprise data center may be joined to the cloudprovider's domain, whereas the tenant owns the actual virtual machines.Providing remote services through the cloud provider may provide somebenefits such as:

SUMMARY

Many principles and operations based on the cloud data infrastructuremodel may be applied to enterprise data centers. Such principles mayinclude image based management, rapid and dynamic provisioning ofresources, service/application centric management, etc. By applicationof such principles in their data centers, a paradigm shift in howenterprise IT organizations operate may be enabled.

Disclosed herein are methods and systems that enable enterprise datacenters to allocate portions of their infrastructure and assign them tospecific line of business (LOB) business unit IT (BUTT) organizations.This allows the BUIT to dynamically and rapidly provision virtualinfrastructure as needed to run LOB applications. This can also enablethe BUIT to focus more on the development and management of the LOBapplications rather than invest significant resources in managing theinfrastructure layer.

In various embodiments, methods and systems are disclosed for enablingdata center administrators to allocate and assign a portion of theirphysical infrastructure (Storage, Network and Compute) and expose themas a virtualized environment to different business unit organizations.

In addition to the foregoing, other aspects are described in the claims,drawings, and text forming a part of the present disclosure. It can beappreciated by one of skill in the art that one or more various aspectsof the disclosure may include but are not limited to circuitry and/orprogramming for effecting the herein-referenced aspects of the presentdisclosure; the circuitry and/or programming can be virtually anycombination of hardware, software, and/or firmware configured to effectthe herein-referenced aspects depending upon the design choices of thesystem designer.

The foregoing is a summary and thus contains, by necessity,simplifications, generalizations and omissions of detail. Those skilledin the art will appreciate that the summary is illustrative only and isnot intended to be in any way limiting.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The systems, methods, and computer readable media for allocatingstorage, network and computing infrastructure as a virtualized computingenvironment to a plurality of user groups in accordance with thisspecification are further described with reference to the accompanyingdrawings in which:

FIGS. 1 and 2 depict an example computer system wherein aspects of thepresent disclosure can be implemented.

FIG. 3 depicts an operational environment for practicing aspects of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 4 depicts an operational environment for practicing aspects of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 5 illustrates a computer system including circuitry foreffectuating remote desktop services.

FIG. 6 depicts an operational environment for practicing aspects of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 7 depicts an operational environment for practicing aspects of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 8 depicts an operational environment for practicing aspects of thepresent disclosure.

FIGS. 9 and 10 illustrate an example operational procedure forpracticing aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 11 illustrates an example operational procedure for practicingaspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 12 illustrates an example system and operational procedure forpracticing aspects of the present disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION Computing Environments in General Terms

Certain specific details are set forth in the following description andfigures to provide a thorough understanding of various embodiments ofthe disclosure. Certain well-known details often associated withcomputing and software technology are not set forth in the followingdisclosure to avoid unnecessarily obscuring the various embodiments ofthe disclosure. Further, those of ordinary skill in the relevant artwill understand that they can practice other embodiments of thedisclosure without one or more of the details described below. Finally,while various methods are described with reference to steps andsequences in the following disclosure, the description as such is forproviding a clear implementation of embodiments of the disclosure, andthe steps and sequences of steps should not be taken as required topractice this disclosure.

It should be understood that the various techniques described herein maybe implemented in connection with hardware or software or, whereappropriate, with a combination of both. Thus, the methods and apparatusof the disclosure, or certain aspects or portions thereof, may take theform of program code (i.e., instructions) embodied in tangible media,such as floppy diskettes, CD-ROMs, hard drives, or any othermachine-readable storage medium wherein, when the program code is loadedinto and executed by a machine, such as a computer, the machine becomesan apparatus for practicing the disclosure. In the case of program codeexecution on programmable computers, the computing device generallyincludes a processor, a storage medium readable by the processor(including volatile and non-volatile memory and/or storage elements), atleast one input device, and at least one output device. One or moreprograms that may implement or utilize the processes described inconnection with the disclosure, e.g., through the use of an applicationprogramming interface (API), reusable controls, or the like. Suchprograms are preferably implemented in a high level procedural or objectoriented programming language to communicate with a computer system.However, the program(s) can be implemented in assembly or machinelanguage, if desired. In any case, the language may be a compiled orinterpreted language, and combined with hardware implementations.

A remote desktop system is a computer system that maintains applicationsthat can be remotely executed by client computer systems. Input isentered at a client computer system and transferred over a network(e.g., using protocols based on the International TelecommunicationsUnion (ITU) T.120 family of protocols such as Remote Desktop Protocol(remote presentation)) to an application on a terminal server. Theapplication processes the input as if the input were entered at theterminal server. The application generates output in response to thereceived input and the output is transferred over the network to theclient

Embodiments may execute on one or more computers. FIGS. 1 and 2 and thefollowing discussion are intended to provide a brief general descriptionof a suitable computing environment in which the disclosure may beimplemented. One skilled in the art can appreciate that computer systems200, 300 can have some or all of the components described with respectto computer 100 of FIGS. 1 and 2.

The term circuitry used throughout the disclosure can include hardwarecomponents such as hardware interrupt controllers, hard drives, networkadaptors, graphics processors, hardware based video/audio codecs, andthe firmware/software used to operate such hardware. The term circuitrycan also include microprocessors configured to perform function(s) byfirmware or by switches set in a certain way or one or more logicalprocessors, e.g., one or more cores of a multi-core general processingunit. The logical processor(s) in this example can be configured bysoftware instructions embodying logic operable to perform function(s)that are loaded from memory, e.g., RAM, ROM, firmware, and/or virtualmemory. In example embodiments where circuitry includes a combination ofhardware and software an implementer may write source code embodyinglogic that is subsequently compiled into machine readable code that canbe executed by a logical processor. Since one skilled in the art canappreciate that the state of the art has evolved to a point where thereis little difference between hardware, software, or a combination ofhardware/software, the selection of hardware versus software toeffectuate functions is merely a design choice. Thus, since one of skillin the art can appreciate that a software process can be transformedinto an equivalent hardware structure, and a hardware structure canitself be transformed into an equivalent software process, the selectionof a hardware implementation versus a software implementation is trivialand left to an implementer.

FIG. 1 depicts an example of a computing system which is configured towith aspects of the disclosure. The computing system can include acomputer 20 or the like, including a processing unit 21, a system memory22, and a system bus 23 that couples various system components includingthe system memory to the processing unit 21. The system bus 23 may beany of several types of bus structures including a memory bus or memorycontroller, a peripheral bus, and a local bus using any of a variety ofbus architectures. The system memory includes read only memory (ROM) 24and random access memory (RAM) 25. A basic input/output system 26(BIOS), containing the basic routines that help to transfer informationbetween elements within the computer 20, such as during start up, isstored in ROM 24. The computer 20 may further include a hard disk drive27 for reading from and writing to a hard disk, not shown, a magneticdisk drive 28 for reading from or writing to a removable magnetic disk29, and an optical disk drive 30 for reading from or writing to aremovable optical disk 31 such as a CD ROM or other optical media. Insome example embodiments, computer executable instructions embodyingaspects of the disclosure may be stored in ROM 24, hard disk (notshown), RAM 25, removable magnetic disk 29, optical disk 31, and/or acache of processing unit 21. The hard disk drive 27, magnetic disk drive28, and optical disk drive 30 are connected to the system bus 23 by ahard disk drive interface 32, a magnetic disk drive interface 33, and anoptical drive interface 34, respectively. The drives and theirassociated computer readable media provide non-volatile storage ofcomputer readable instructions, data structures, program modules andother data for the computer 20. Although the environment describedherein employs a hard disk, a removable magnetic disk 29 and a removableoptical disk 31, it should be appreciated by those skilled in the artthat other types of computer readable media which can store data that isaccessible by a computer, such as magnetic cassettes, flash memorycards, digital video disks, Bernoulli cartridges, random access memories(RAMs), read only memories (ROMs) and the like may also be used in theoperating environment.

A number of program modules may be stored on the hard disk, magneticdisk 29, optical disk 31, ROM 24 or RAM 25, including an operatingsystem 35, one or more application programs 36, other program modules 37and program data 38. A user may enter commands and information into thecomputer 20 through input devices such as a keyboard 40 and pointingdevice 42. Other input devices (not shown) may include a microphone,joystick, game pad, satellite disk, scanner or the like. These and otherinput devices are often connected to the processing unit 21 through aserial port interface 46 that is coupled to the system bus, but may beconnected by other interfaces, such as a parallel port, game port oruniversal serial bus (USB). A display 47 or other type of display devicecan also be connected to the system bus 23 via an interface, such as avideo adapter 48. In addition to the display 47, computers typicallyinclude other peripheral output devices (not shown), such as speakersand printers. The system of FIG. 1 also includes a host adapter 55,Small Computer System Interface (SCSI) bus 56, and an external storagedevice 62 connected to the SCSI bus 56.

The computer 20 may operate in a networked environment using logicalconnections to one or more remote computers, such as a remote computer49. The remote computer 49 may be another computer, a server, a router,a network PC, a peer device or other common network node, a virtualmachine, and typically can include many or all of the elements describedabove relative to the computer 20, although only a memory storage device50 has been illustrated in FIG. 1. The logical connections depicted inFIG. 1 can include a local area network (LAN) 51 and a wide area network(WAN) 52. Such networking environments are commonplace in offices,enterprise wide computer networks, intranets and the Internet.

When used in a LAN networking environment, the computer 20 can beconnected to the LAN 51 through a network interface or adapter 53. Whenused in a WAN networking environment, the computer 20 can typicallyinclude a modem 54 or other means for establishing communications overthe wide area network 52, such as the Internet. The modem 54, which maybe internal or external, can be connected to the system bus 23 via theserial port interface 46. In a networked environment, program modulesdepicted relative to the computer 20, or portions thereof, may be storedin the remote memory storage device. It will be appreciated that thenetwork connections shown are examples and other means of establishing acommunications link between the computers may be used. Moreover, whileit is envisioned that numerous embodiments of the disclosure areparticularly well-suited for computer systems, nothing in this documentis intended to limit the disclosure to such embodiments.

Referring now to FIG. 2, another embodiment of an exemplary computingsystem 100 is depicted. Computer system 100 can include a logicalprocessor 102, e.g., an execution core. While one logical processor 102is illustrated, in other embodiments computer system 100 may havemultiple logical processors, e.g., multiple execution cores perprocessor substrate and/or multiple processor substrates that could eachhave multiple execution cores. As shown by the figure, various computerreadable storage media 110 can be interconnected by one or more systembusses which couples various system components to the logical processor102. The system buses may be any of several types of bus structuresincluding a memory bus or memory controller, a peripheral bus, and alocal bus using any of a variety of bus architectures. In exampleembodiments the computer readable storage media 110 can include forexample, random access memory (RAM) 104, storage device 106, e.g.,electromechanical hard drive, solid state hard drive, etc., firmware108, e.g., FLASH RAM or ROM, and removable storage devices 118 such as,for example, CD-ROMs, floppy disks, DVDs, FLASH drives, external storagedevices, etc. It should be appreciated by those skilled in the art thatother types of computer readable storage media can be used such asmagnetic cassettes, flash memory cards, digital video disks, Bernoullicartridges.

The computer readable storage media provide non-volatile storage ofprocessor executable instructions 122, data structures, program modulesand other data for the computer 100. A basic input/output system (BIOS)120, containing the basic routines that help to transfer informationbetween elements within the computer system 100, such as during startup, can be stored in firmware 108. A number of programs may be stored onfirmware 108, storage device 106, RAM 104, and/or removable storagedevices 118, and executed by logical processor 102 including anoperating system and/or application programs.

Commands and information may be received by computer 100 through inputdevices 116 which can include, but are not limited to, a keyboard andpointing device. Other input devices may include a microphone, joystick,game pad, scanner or the like. These and other input devices are oftenconnected to the logical processor 102 through a serial port interfacethat is coupled to the system bus, but may be connected by otherinterfaces, such as a parallel port, game port or universal serial bus(USB). A display or other type of display device can also be connectedto the system bus via an interface, such as a video adapter which can bepart of, or connected to, a graphics processor 112. In addition to thedisplay, computers typically include other peripheral output devices(not shown), such as speakers and printers. The exemplary system of FIG.1 can also include a host adapter, Small Computer System Interface(SCSI) bus, and an external storage device connected to the SCSI bus.

Computer system 100 may operate in a networked environment using logicalconnections to one or more remote computers, such as a remote computer.The remote computer may be another computer, a server, a router, anetwork PC, a peer device or other common network node, and typicallycan include many or all of the elements described above relative tocomputer system 100.

When used in a LAN or WAN networking environment, computer system 100can be connected to the LAN or WAN through a network interface card 114.The NIC 114, which may be internal or external, can be connected to thesystem bus. In a networked environment, program modules depictedrelative to the computer system 100, or portions thereof, may be storedin the remote memory storage device. It will be appreciated that thenetwork connections described here are exemplary and other means ofestablishing a communications link between the computers may be used.Moreover, while it is envisioned that numerous embodiments of thepresent disclosure are particularly well-suited for computerizedsystems, nothing in this document is intended to limit the disclosure tosuch embodiments.

A remote desktop system is a computer system that maintains applicationsthat can be remotely executed by client computer systems. Input isentered at a client computer system and transferred over a network(e.g., using protocols based on the International TelecommunicationsUnion (ITU) T.120 family of protocols such as Remote Desktop Protocol(remote presentation)) to an application on a terminal server. Theapplication processes the input as if the input were entered at theterminal server. The application generates output in response to thereceived input and the output is transferred over the network to theclient computer system. The client computer system presents the outputdata. Thus, input is received and output presented at the clientcomputer system, while processing actually occurs at the terminalserver. A session can include a shell and a user interface such as adesktop, the subsystems that track mouse movement within the desktop,the subsystems that translate a mouse click on an icon into commandsthat effectuate an instance of a program, etc. In another exampleembodiment the session can include an application. In this example whilean application is rendered, a desktop environment may still be generatedand hidden from the user. It should be understood that the foregoingdiscussion is exemplary and that the presently disclosed subject mattermay be implemented in various client/server environments and not limitedto a particular terminal services product.

In most, if not all remote desktop environments, input data (entered ata client computer system) typically includes mouse and keyboard datarepresenting commands to an application and output data (generated by anapplication at the terminal server) typically includes video data fordisplay on a video output device. Many remote desktop environments alsoinclude functionality that extend to transfer other types of data.

Communications channels can be used to extend the remote presentationprotocol by allowing plug-ins to transfer data over a remotepresentation connection. Many such extensions exist. Features such asprinter redirection, clipboard redirection, port redirection, etc., usecommunications channel technology. Thus, in addition to input and outputdata, there may be many communications channels that need to transferdata. Accordingly, there may be occasional requests to transfer outputdata and one or more channel requests to transfer other data contendingfor available network bandwidth.

Turning to FIG. 3, illustrated is an exemplary virtual machine serverthat can be used to generate virtual machines. In this embodiment,hypervisor microkernel 302 can be configured to control and arbitrateaccess to the hardware of computer system 300. Hypervisor microkernel302 can isolate processes in one partition from accessing anotherpartition's resources. For example, hypervisor microkernel 302 cangenerate execution environments called partitions such as childpartition 1 through child partition N (where N is an integer greaterthan 1). In this embodiment, a child partition is the basic unit ofisolation supported by hypervisor microkernel 302. Each child partitioncan be mapped to a set of hardware resources, e.g., memory, devices,logical processor cycles, etc., that is under control of the hypervisormicrokernel 302. In embodiments hypervisor microkernel 302 can be astand-alone software product, a part of an operating system, embeddedwithin firmware of the motherboard, specialized integrated circuits, ora combination thereof

Hypervisor microkernel 302 can enforce partitioning by restricting aguest operating system's view of the memory in a physical computersystem. When hypervisor microkernel 302 instantiates a virtual machine,it can allocate pages, e.g., fixed length blocks of memory with startingand ending addresses, of system physical memory (SPM) to the virtualmachine as guest physical memory (GPM). In this embodiment, the guest'srestricted view of system memory is controlled by hypervisor microkernel302. The term guest physical memory is a shorthand way of describing apage of memory from the viewpoint of a virtual machine and the termsystem physical memory is shorthand way of describing a page of memoryfrom the viewpoint of the physical system. Thus, a page of memoryallocated to a virtual machine will have a guest physical address (theaddress used by the virtual machine) and a system physical address (theactual address of the page).

A guest operating system may virtualize guest physical memory. Virtualmemory is a management technique that allows an operating system to overcommit memory and to give an application sole access to a contiguousworking memory. In a virtualized environment, a guest operating systemcan use one or more page tables to translate virtual addresses, known asvirtual guest addresses into guest physical addresses. In this example,a memory address may have a guest virtual address, a guest physicaladdress, and a system physical address.

In the depicted example, parent partition component, which can also bealso thought of as similar to domain 0 of Xen's open source hypervisorcan include a host 304. Host 304 can be an operating system (or a set ofconfiguration utilities) and host 304 can be configured to provideresources to guest operating systems executing in the child partitions1-N by using virtualization service providers 328 (VSPs). VPSs 328,which are typically referred to as back-end drivers in the open sourcecommunity, can be used to multiplex the interfaces to the hardwareresources by way of virtualization service clients (VSCs) (typicallyreferred to as front-end drivers in the open source community orparavirtualized devices). As shown by the figures, virtualizationservice clients execute within the context of guest operating systems.However, these drivers are different than the rest of the drivers in theguest in that they may be supplied with a hypervisor, not with a guest.In an exemplary embodiment the path used to by virtualization serviceproviders 328 to communicate with virtualization service clients 316 and318 can be thought of as the virtualization path.

As shown by the figure, emulators 334, e.g., virtualized IDE devices,virtualized video adaptors, virtualized NICs, etc., can be configured torun within host 304 and are attached to resources available to guestoperating systems 330 and 322. For example, when a guest OS touches amemory location mapped to where a register of a device would be ormemory mapped to a device, microkernel hypervisor 302 can intercept therequest and pass the values the guest attempted to write to anassociated emulator. The resources in this example can be thought of aswhere a virtual device is located. The use of emulators in this way canbe considered the emulation path. The emulation path is inefficientcompared to the virtualized path because it requires more CPU resourcesto emulate device than it does to pass messages between VSPs and VSCs.For example, the hundreds of actions on memory mapped to registersrequired in order to write a value to disk via the emulation path may bereduced to a single message passed from a VSC to a VSP in thevirtualization path.

Each child partition can include one or more virtual processors (320 and322) that guest operating systems (320 and 322) can manage and schedulethreads to execute thereon. Generally, the virtual processors areexecutable instructions and associated state information that provide arepresentation of a physical processor with a specific architecture. Forexample, one virtual machine may have a virtual processor havingcharacteristics of an Intel x86 processor, whereas another virtualprocessor may have the characteristics of a PowerPC processor. Thevirtual processors in this example can be mapped to logical processorsof the computer system such that the instructions that effectuate thevirtual processors will be backed by logical processors. Thus, in anembodiment including multiple logical processors, virtual processors canbe simultaneously executed by logical processors while, for example,other logical processor execute hypervisor instructions. The combinationof virtual processors and memory in a partition can be considered avirtual machine.

Guest operating systems (320 and 322) can be any operating system suchas, for example, operating systems from Microsoft®, Apple®, the opensource community, etc. The guest operating systems can includeuser/kernel modes of operation and can have kernels that can includeschedulers, memory managers, etc. Generally speaking, kernel mode caninclude an execution mode in a logical processor that grants access toat least privileged processor instructions. Each guest operating systemcan have associated file systems that can have applications storedthereon such as terminal servers, e-commerce servers, email servers,etc., and the guest operating systems themselves. The guest operatingsystems can schedule threads to execute on the virtual processors andinstances of such applications can be effectuated.

Referring now to FIG. 4, illustrated is a virtual machine server basedon an alternative architecture. FIG. 4 depicts similar components tothose of FIG. 3; however, in this example embodiment hypervisor 402 caninclude a microkernel component and components similar to those in host304 of FIG. 3 such as the virtualization service providers 328 anddevice drivers 324, while management operating system 404 may contain,for example, configuration utilities used to configure hypervisor 402.In this architecture, hypervisor 402 can perform the same or similarfunctions as hypervisor microkernel 302 of FIG. 3; however, in thisarchitecture hypervisor 404 can be configured to provide resources toguest operating systems executing in the child partitions. Hypervisor402 of FIG. 4 can be a stand alone software product, a part of anoperating system, embedded within firmware of the motherboard or aportion of hypervisor 402 can be effectuated by specialized integratedcircuits.

Turning now to FIG. 5, illustrated is a high-level block diagram ofvirtual desktop server 500. In an embodiment, virtual desktop server 500can be configured to deploy virtual desktop sessions (VDS) to clients,e.g., mobile devices such as smart phones, computer systems havingcomponents similar to those illustrated in FIG. 1, etc. Briefly, virtualdesktop technology allows a user to remotely interact with a guestoperating system running in a virtual machine. Unlike a remote desktopsession, in a virtual desktop session only one user is logged into aguest operating system and can have total control of it, e.g., the usercan run as an administrator and can have full rights on the guest. Inthe illustrated example, virtual desktop server 500 can have componentssimilar to computer system 300 or 400 of FIG. 3 or FIG. 4. In theillustrated example, virtualization platform 502 is a logicalabstraction of virtualization infrastructure components described abovein FIG. 3 and FIG. 4. The functionality described in the followingsections as “within” virtualization platform 502 can be implemented inone or more of the elements depicted in FIG. 3 or FIG. 4. For example,virtual desktop manager 530 could be implemented in a host 304 of FIG.3. More specifically, virtual desktop manager 530 could be implementedin a host operating system running in the parent partition.

Starting a virtual desktop session requires instantiation of a guestoperating system within a virtual machine. In an exemplary embodiment,virtual desktop manager 530, e.g., a module of processor executableinstructions, can start up virtual machine 514 (along with guestoperating system 528) in response to a request. Virtual desktop manager530 can execute on a logical processor and instruct virtualizationplatform 502, e.g., microkernel hypervisor 202, to allocate memory for apartition. Virtualization platform 502 can execute and set virtualdevices up within virtual machine 514 and load a boot loader programinto virtual machine memory. The boot loader program can execute on avirtual processor and load guest operating system 528. For example,session manager 508 can be loaded, which can instantiate environmentsubsystems such as runtime subsystem 526 that can include a kernel modepart such as operating system core 510. For example, the environmentsubsystems in an embodiment can be configured to expose a subset ofservices to application programs and provide an access point to kernel520. When guest operating system 528 is loaded, the boot loader programcan exit and turn control of the virtual machine over to guest operatingsystem 528. Guest operating system 528 can execute the various modulesillustrated in FIG. 5 and configure itself to host a virtual desktopsession. For example, guest operating system 528 can include registryvalues that cause remote presentation engine 506 and/or configurationservice 534 to start upon boot.

A virtual desktop session can start when guest operating system 528receives a connection request over a network from a client. A connectionrequest can first be handled by remote presentation engine 506. Theremote presentation engine 506 can be configured to listen forconnection messages and forward them to session manager 508. Asillustrated by FIG. 3, when sessions are generated the remotepresentation engine 506 can run a protocol stack instances for thesession. Generally, the protocol stack instance can be configured toroute user interface output to an associated client and route user inputreceived from the associated client to operating system core 510.Briefly, operating system core 510 can be configured to manage screenoutput; collect input from keyboards, mice, and other devices.

A user credential, e.g., a username/password combination, can bereceived by remote presentation engine 506 and passed to session manager508. Session manager 508 can pass the credential to a logon procedure,which can route the credential to authentication engine 524 forverification. Authentication engine 524 can generate a system token,which can be used whenever a user attempts to execute a process todetermine whether the user has the security credentials to run theprocess or thread. For example, when a process or thread attempts togain access, e.g., open, close, delete, and/or modify an object, e.g., afile, setting, or an application, the thread or process can beauthenticated by security subsystem 522. Security subsystem 522 cancheck the system token against an access control list associated withthe object and determine whether the thread has permission based on acomparison of information in the system token and the access controllist. If security subsystem 522 determines that the thread is authorizedthen the thread can be allowed to access the object.

Continuing with the description of FIG. 5, in an embodiment theoperating system core 510 can include a graphics display interface 516(GDI) and input subsystem 512. Input subsystem 512 in an exampleembodiment can be configured to receive user input from a client via theprotocol stack instance for the virtual desktop session and send theinput to operating system core 510. The user input can in someembodiments include signals indicative of absolute and/or relative mousemovement commands, mouse coordinates, mouse clicks, keyboard signals,joystick movement signals, etc. User input, for example, a mousedouble-click on an icon, can be received by the operating system core510 and the input subsystem 512 can be configured to determine that anicon is located at the coordinates associated with the double-click.Input subsystem 512 can then be configured to send a notification toruntime subsystem 526 that can execute a process for the applicationassociated with the icon.

Draw commands can be received from applications and/or a desktop andprocessed by GDI 516. GDI 516 in general can include a process that cangenerate graphical object draw commands. GDI 516 in this exampleembodiment can be configured to pass the commands to remote displaysubsystem 518 that can instantiate a display driver for the session. Inan example embodiment remote display subsystem 518 can be configured toinclude virtual display driver(s) that can be configured to receive thedraw commands and send them to the client.

Also shown in FIG. 5 is a configuration service 534. In an exemplaryembodiment, configuration service 534 can be used to setup guestoperating system 528 to conduct virtual desktop sessions prior toconnection by a client. For example, configuration service 534 can runwithin guest operating system 528 and be executed when guest operatingsystem 528 boots. Since certain configuration settings requireadministrative privileges, configuration service 534 can be configuredto run as a process with system wide privileges. Some of the exemplaryactions configuration service 534 can take include, but are not limitedto, actions that add an account identifier for the user to a list ofadministrative users for guest operating system 528, add the accountidentifier to a list of authorized virtual desktop users, set registryvalues, open guest operating system firewalls, and open the port thatremote presentation engine 506 listens for connections on. Configurationservice 534 is described in more detail in the following paragraphs.

In an exemplary embodiment, a communication channel can be establishedbetween virtualization platform 502 and guest operating system 528 inorder to configure and control guest operating system 528. Since aremote user can have complete control of virtual machine 514, securityneeds to be in place to ensure that any channel used to configure andcontrol guest operating system 528 can not also be used to attackvirtualization platform 502 or other computer systems connected to aninternal network. Traditionally, a networked communication channel isused to setup and control guest operating system 528. Network channels,however are difficult to deploy when guest operating system 528 is notin the same network domain as virtualization platform 502 andvirtualization platform 502 is configured to deny incoming connectionrequests from outside the domain.

In an exemplary embodiment, inter-partition communication channel 504can be used to communicate with configuration server 534 in order toconfigure and/or manage the virtual desktop session. Inter-partitioncommunication channel 504 can be configured to be implicitly trusted byvirtual machine 514 and not trusted by virtualization platform 502. Inthis example, information, e.g., data and/or commands can be easilyrouted to guest operating system 528 without any need to verify theinformation. On the other hand, data received from virtual machine 514can be verified and authenticated before virtualization platform 502takes an action. Moreover, because inter-partition communication channel504 does not use networking, guest operating system 528 can be kept offthe internal network.

Inter-partition communication channel 504 can be implicitly trusted byvirtual machine 514, i.e., information received via the channel isinherently authenticated/validated, because only virtualization platform502 can create inter-partition communication channel 504. For example,in an embodiment inter-partition communication channel 504 can beimplemented at least in part as a region of memory shared betweenvirtual machine 514 and virtualization platform 502. Virtualizationplatform 502 can cause a data structure indicative of a ring buffer orthe like to be created in region of shared memory that can be used as afull-duplex communication channel between virtualization platform 502and virtual machine 514. In an exemplary embodiment, the inter-partitioncommunication channel can include features described in U.S. Pat. No.7,689,800 entitled “Partition bus,” the contents of which are hereinincorporated by reference in its entirety.

Virtualization platform 502 can write information to inter-partitioncommunication channel 504 that can be read by virtual machine 514. In anexemplary embodiment, inter-partition communication channel 504 can bemessage based. That is, virtualization platform 502 and virtual machine514 can be configured to write packets of data to inter-partitioncommunication channel 504. In the same, or another exemplary embodiment,inter-partition communication channel 504 can be event driven. In thisconfiguration, when information is written to the channel, the receivercan be instructed to read the information from inter-partitioncommunication channel 504 by for example, hypervisor 302 of FIG. 3.

Turning now to FIG. 6, illustrated is a high-level block diagram of adatacenter including virtual desktop server 500, virtual desktop server602, licensing server 604, broker server 608, gateway 612, and client614. The datacenter can be configured to deploy virtual desktop sessionsto clients. In the illustrated example, virtualization platform 502,virtual desktop server 602, licensing server 604, broker server 608, andgateway 612 can be part of an intranet and the user credentials used tolog into these computers can be members of the same domain, i.e., theinfrastructure domain 520. Infrastructure domain 520 is shown in dashedlines cutting virtual desktop server 500 in half to illustrate that inan exemplary embodiment, virtual machine 514 can be part of a differentdomain or part of no domain.

The datacenter can include an internal network coupling a plurality ofvirtual desktop servers (602 and 500), which can include componentssimilar to those illustrated by FIG. 3 or 4, to broker server 608 andlicensing server 604. As one of skill in the art can appreciate, whiletwo virtual desktop servers are shown the datacenter can have many more.Also, while virtual desktop server 500 is illustrated running onevirtual machine (514), each virtual desktop server can simultaneouslyhost many virtual machines. Or put another way, the datacenter can haveM (where M is an integer greater than 1) virtual desktop servers andeach of the M virtualization hosts can host N (where N is also aninteger greater than 1) virtual machines.

Broker server 608 can act as an interface to the intranet for client614. Briefly, broker server 608 can include components similar to thecomponents described with respect to FIG. 2. Broker server 608 can havea network adapter that interfaces it to a public network, such as theInternet, and another network adapter that interfaces it to the internalnetwork, i.e., the intranet. In this example, broker server 608 can actas a gateway for the internal network, thereby allowing virtual desktopservers and licensing server 604 to be kept off the public network.

When user of client 614 wants a virtual desktop session, he or she canclick on an icon and client 614 can send one or more packets ofinformation to broker server 608. Broker server 608 can include a moduleof software instructions that upon execution cause a logical processorto select a suitable virtualization host to instantiate a virtualmachine to host the virtual desktop session. A user credential, e.g., ausername and password combination, can be collected and broker server608 can check session database 610 to determine whether the datacenterincludes any disconnected virtual desktop sessions associated with theuser credential such as a username/password combination. If sessiondatabase 610 includes a disconnected virtual desktop session associatedwith the user credential, broker server 608 can send a signal to thevirtualization host that has the disconnected session and instruct it toexecute the virtual machine. If session database 610 does not haveinformation indicative of a disconnected session for the user, brokerserver 608 can select a suitable virtual desktop server, e.g., one thathas the resources available to instantiate a virtual machine to host avirtual desktop session.

Virtualization platform 502 can instantiate virtual machine 514 andexecute guest operating system 528 on a virtual processor. Referringback to FIG. 5, guest operating system 528 can run remote presentationengine 506; return an internet protocol (IP) address of virtual NIC 616to broker server 608; and await a connection from client 614. Brokerserver 608 can return the IP address of virtual NIC 616 to client 614 ina packet of information that causes a logical processor of client 614 toredirect client to the IP address virtual machine 514. Gateway 612 canreceive the connection request and forward it to virtual NIC 616.

In at least one exemplary embodiment, session manager 508 can beconfigured to check to see if the client 614 is associated with a validlicense before starting the virtual desktop session. Remote presentationengine 506 can receive a license from client 614 (or informationassociated with a license) and send the information to virtualizationplatform 502, which can send the license (or the information associatedwith the license) to licensing server 604. Licensing server 604 caninclude license validation engine 606, which can be configured todetermine whether a license associated with client 614 is valid. If thelicense is valid, license validation engine 606 can send a signal backvirtual desktop server 500 and a virtual desktop session can be started.At this point, remote presentation engine 506 can stream one or morepackets of information indicative of a graphical user interface forguest operating system 528 to client 614 and receive one or more packetsof information indicative of user input from client 614.

In an exemplary embodiment, when virtualization platform 502 receives arequest from broker server 608 to instantiate a virtual machine, virtualdesktop manager 530 can execute and send commands and/or information viainter-partition communication channel 504 to virtual machine 514 tocause guest operating system 528 to be configured to conduct a virtualdesktop session. Configuration service 534 can receive the commandsand/or information and configure guest operating system 528 accordingly.For example, virtual desktop manager 530 can send the identity of theuser attempting to connect, desired settings for a firewall protectingguest operating system 528, registry values, a list of applications theuser is allowed to operate, commands to enable virtual desktop sessionsand to add the identity of the user to a list of authorized virtualdesktop users, etc. Configuration service 534 can execute on a virtualprocessor and change appropriate settings.

Once the virtual desktop session is running, virtual desktop manager 530can manage a running virtual desktop session via inter-partitioncommunication channel 504. For example, virtual desktop manager 530 canissue commands to virtual machine 514 such as commands that cause theguest operating system 528 to shut down, disconnect the user, reset theguest operating system 528, etc. In the same, or another embodiment,virtual desktop manager 530 can manage the virtual desktop sessionreceive state information for virtual machine 514, status informationfrom remote presentation engine 506, and/or send commands to control thevirtual desktop session to configuration service 534. For example,virtual desktop manager 530 can receive state information for virtualmachine 514 that indicates whether virtual machine 514 is running,paused, ready, booting, as well as a list of IP addresses that can besent to the client. In addition, virtual desktop manager 530 can receivestatus information for guest operating system 528 such as the identityof the user that is logged in for the virtual desktop session, andcommunicate some or all of this information to broker server 608.

FIG. 7 depicts an example system where a client has a workspace thatcomprises remote sessions with a plurality of servers.

The computers depicted in FIG. 7 may be similar to the computer depictedin FIG. 1. In FIG. 7, a client 702 communicates with a deployment 700,which comprises authentication server 704, connection broker 708,gateway 708, remote application server farm 714 (which in turn comprisestwo homogenously configured servers, remote application servers 716a-b), and VM server farm 710 (which in turn comprises two homogenouslyconfigured VMs, VMs 712 a-b).

Client 702 has a workspace that comprises multiple remote resourcesserved by one or more of remote application servers 716 and VMs 712.Client 702 may log into its workspace through an authentication server704. Once authenticated, the client's request to connect to itsworkspace is transmitted from authentication server 704 to connectionbroker 706. Connection broker 706 is configured to broker connectionsbetween client 702 and the application servers 716 and VMs 712 that willserve remote resources with client 702, and to effectuate this,connection broker 706 is configured to communicate with applicationservers 716 and VMs 712 to determine what resources they are currentlyserving (including disconnected remote resources for a user of client702).

Client 702 may have a workspace that comprises multiple remoteresources—a remote resource comprising a remote application from remoteapplication server 716 a, and a remote resource that comprises a VM fromVM 712 a. As depicted, client 702 does not have a remote resource withremote application server 716 b or VM 712 b. These may each servedifferent applications or desktops, versions of an application, or otherpermutations. For instance, remote application server 716 a may beserving client 702 with a remoted word processor application, and VM 712may be serving client 702 with a remote desktop.

As can be seen through this depiction, when a user wishes to reconnectback to his or her workspace, he may desire to reconnect to the remoteresources of both remote application server 716 a and VM 712 a throughone command, rather than through one command performed three times. Theuser may perform this reconnect operation from client 702, or fromanother client computer (such as where client 702 is the user's computerat work, and the user wishes to reconnect from a computer at home duringthe weekend).

FIG. 8 depicts an example an example communication flow for a clientreconnecting to a remote resource of a workspace.

FIG. 8 depicts an example communication flow in a system where a clientreconnects a workspace that comprises remote sessions with a pluralityof servers. This communication flow may be effectuated in a system, suchas the computer system depicted in FIG. 7. To wit, remote deployment800, client 802, authentication server 804, connection broker 806,gateway 808, VM farm 810 and VM 812 a of FIG. 8 may be similar to remotedeployment 200, client 202, authentication server 204, connection broker206, gateway 208, VM farm 210 and VM 212 a, respectively, of FIG. 7.

A user of client 802 has previously had a workspace to remote serverfarm 800 that involved accessing a remote resource from VM 812 a, andthis workspace is now disconnected. Before client 802 even attempts toreconnect to the deployment 800, authentication server 804 publishes adocument (via communication (1)) to client 802 identifying informationabout the deployment 800 that client 802 may use to access the remoteresources of the deployment 800. Client 802 later reconnects by sendingcommunication (2) to authentication server 804. Authentication server804 validates credentials of the user and/or client (such as a login andpassword). Where the credentials are validated, authentication server804 communicates with connection broker 806 to determine which remoteresources (here, VM 812 a) client 802 is to reconnect to whenreconnecting its workspace. Authentication server 804 makes thisdetermination by sending communication (3) to connection broker 806,and, in response, receiving back in communication (4) a list of serverfarms (here, VM farm 810) for client 802 to reconnect to. Thisinformation indicated in communication (4) is passed by authenticationserver 804 to client 802 in communication (5).

When client 802 has the list of servers to reconnect to fromauthentication server 804, client 802 reestablishes a communication witheach of those server farms. As depicted in FIG. 8, that server farm isVM farm 810. Client 802 communicates (6) with gateway 808 to access theremote resources of these server farms. Gateway 808 processescommunication (6), and in turn communicates (7) with connection broker806 to convey similar information. Connection broker 806 takes theidentification of the server farm from communication (7) and from it,identifies the machine (VM 812 a) within the farm 810 that has thatdisconnected remote resource. Connection broker 806 sends communication(8) to VM 812 a, instructing VM 812 a to reconnect the remote resourceto client 802. VM 812 a reconnects with client 802 by sending acommunication (9) indicative of the same to gateway 808, which, in turnsends a communication (10) indicative of the same to client 802.

It may be appreciated that this is a simplified diagram to emphasize thepresent invention, and that more or fewer server farms may be presentand/or reconnected to, and that the communications passed may be moreinvolved (for instance, it is shown that communications (9) and (10)establish a reconnection between VM 812 a and client 802, where this mayalso involve communications that are send from client 802 throughgateway 808 and to VM 812 a).

All of these variations for implementing the above mentioned virtualmachines are just exemplary implementations, and nothing herein shouldbe interpreted as limiting the disclosure to any particularvirtualization aspect.

Remote Access to Hosted Virtual Machines by Enterprise Users

Many principles and operations derived from cloud data centers may beapplicable to enterprise data centers. Such principles may include imagebased management, rapid and dynamic provisioning of resources,service/application centric management, etc. By application of suchprinciples in their data centers, a paradigm shift in how enterprise ITorganizations operate may be enabled.

Disclosed herein are methods and systems that enable enterprise datacenters to allocate portions of their infrastructure and assign them tospecific line of business (LOB) business unit IT (BUTT) organizations.This allows the BUIT to dynamically and rapidly provision virtualinfrastructure as needed to run LOB applications. This can also enablethe BUIT to focus more on the development and management of the LOBapplications rather than invest significant resources in managing theinfrastructure layer.

In various embodiments, methods and systems are disclosed for enablingdata center administrators to allocate and assign a portion of theirphysical infrastructure (Storage, Network and Compute) and exposed themas a virtualized environment to different business unit organizations.

In one embodiment, the following process flow an example implementationfor enabling a system for allocating physical infrastructure andexposing a portion of the allocated infrastructure to the BUITs as aservice within the enterprise.

1. The data center administrator may install and configure the systemlevel data center configuration, expose the portion of theinfrastructure that they want to offer as part of the service and toallow for extensibility authoring. Examples include the VMM server name,network segment, domain, and extensibility scripts.

2. The BUIT administrator may register the business unit name.

3. The BUIT may request allocation of a virtual environment. The requestmay occur during initial setup and also as a change request.

4. The data center administrator may approve or deny the request.

5. The data center administrator may provision the system with theallocated resources.

6. The data center administrator may provide access to the BUIT'sself-service portal to allow access to the BUIT's virtual environment.

7. BUIT users may access the self-service portal and perform virtualmachine actions in their virtual environment.

A self-service portal may be a web component that extends management ofvirtual machines to end users. The self-service portal may be anextensible component built on top of a virtualization system. The systemcan be used to pool, allocate, and manage resources to offerinfrastructure as a service and to deliver the foundation for a privatecloud platform inside the enterprise. The self-service portal extendsthe assignment of virtual machines to end users. The self-service portalmay include a web-based user interface that includes sections fordatacenter managers and business unit IT consumers. The self-serviceportal may include a dynamic provisioning engine, and may reduce thetime needed to provision infrastructures and their components byoffering business unit on-boarding and infrastructure request and changemanagement. Some embodiments may provide reporting via a dashboarddisplay that allows users to view data such as configuration,chargeback, and utilization.

In an embodiment, an engine may be provided that brokers the executionof actions and tasks to the appropriate infrastructure. The engine mayfurther comprise functions and capabilities as follows.

The engine may provide various interfaces to exposes its services. Inone embodiment in the Windows environment, the API can be the WindowsCommunication Foundation (WCF) which is an API in the .NET Framework forbuilding connected service-oriented applications. The WCF services maybe provided for interoperability with cross platform systems.

The engine may comprise a throttling and queuing mechanism, which mayfurther comprise a job manager component. Referring to FIG. 10, a jobmanager 1005 may be configured to determine if a requested job can beprocessed. In one embodiment the determination may be made as follows.

Let x be the number of workflows currently being executed by a runtime1020.

Let y be the number of jobs in the queue.

Let T be the maximum number of jobs that the system is configured for.

Let U be the number of new jobs to be processed.

If T−(x+y)>U then the job manager may accept the request. If T−(x+y)<Uthen the job manager may reject the request.

Once accepted, the job manager may queue the requested jobs in a messagequeue. When a job can be executed, the job manager may retrieve the nextjob from the message queue and create an instance of a workflowtemplate. The workflow template can be scheduled for execution by theworkflow runtime.

The job manager may implement queues with different priorities and placeactions into the priority queues to throttle the execution of actions.“Light” virtual machine actions such as starting, stopping, and storingvirtual machines may be stored into a high priority queue, while “heavy”virtual machine actions such as creating a virtual machine may be storedin a normal priority queue.

In an embodiment, a task automation framework may be used for systemadministration. Such a framework may further implement a scriptinglanguage such as Windows PowerShell. PowerShell (PS) is a command-lineshell and associated scripting language built on top of, and integratedwith, the .NET Framework. Administrative tasks are generally performedby cmdlets that implement a particular operation. Sets of cmdlets may becombined together in scripts.

Referring again to FIG. 10, in an embodiment, once the job manager 1005creates and executes a workflow instance 1025, the job manager 1005 maytraverse the task in each action XML which may be associated withmultiple scripts. The job manager may further dynamically wrap thescripts for each task as a workflow activity, add the activity into theworkflow sequence activity, and schedule the workflow instance forexecution.

For execution of each of the workflow activities, the job manager 1005may call a script manager 1010. The script manager 1010 may beconfigured to host the PS run space pool 1015 and spawn a PS run spacefrom the PS run space pool 1015. The script manager 1010 may further beconfigured to execute the PS script. While this is happening theworkflow can be persisted until the calls return.

In the context of the execution of VMM cmdlets, the script manager 1010may further be configured to check for available connections,established one connection, and reuse the connection for all actions.The script manager 1010 may further ensure atomic execution of thevirtual machine placement to ensure accurate placement. In oneembodiment this can be accomplished by providing the ability to callportions of the script in a lock. The script manager 1010 may limit ofthe number of virtual machines per host to reduce the risk of failureoccurrences.

Data can be passed between several components within the engine—from jobmanager to workflow, from workflow to workflow activities, from aworkflow script activity to the script manager, and from the output of ascript activity to the input of another script activity as a scriptparameter. Furthermore, passing secured credentials may be performed asa secured string.

Each PS script that is associated with a task may require inputparameters that can be hardcoded at authoring time. Alternatively, theengine's data item can be referenced and can be evaluated at runtime. Adata item can be an XML blob that holds the environment data, userspecified data based on the job requested, and other data that is neededby the job to execute but not specified by the user. The data item mayserve as the data repository for a workflow and all of its activities.The workflow activities may rely on the data item for any input that theactivities may need. The data item may be kept simple and thus notchange based on the job being requested. However, in other embodimentsthe data item schema can be expanded to include child data items and toallow a data item per each type of job being requested.

The engine may further be configured to enable persisting and passing ofthe task script's output parameters to different task scripts. In oneembodiment the engine may create a new “Output” section in the data itemcontaining the task name and a property bag of each of its outputs in ahierarchical structure. The user can use the user interface to bind theoutput (task.param(x)) to the input of other task script activities.

The output parameters can be configured to be either a simple type or acomplex type. Simple types may be stored in the data item. Complex typesmay be stored in a collection in the data service and a placeholderreference to the complex type may be added to the data item so that theactivity can actually extract the complex type's value when required.

Referring to FIG. 9, in various embodiments a user interface 915 may beprovided to allow for on-boarding, provisioning, and extensibility ofvirtual machine action abstraction. In one embodiment, the userinterface entities and their relationships may be structured to embody aone-to-many relationship. For example, the end to end system may have a1 to M relationship with the data center. The data center may in turnhave a 1 to M relationship with the infrastructure. The infrastructuremay in turn have 1 to M relationship with the infrastructure service.The infrastructure service may have a 1 to M relationship to the servicerole. Finally, the service role may have 1 to M relationship with thevirtual machines.

In an embodiment, when the administrator is performing configurationactions, the administrator may be provided the capability to configurereservation based and allocation based chargebacks. Chargebacks mayinclude the return of funds to business unit or a reversal of a prioroutbound transfer of funds based on the requested, allocated and usedresources. Chargebacks may also include providing a monetary amountvalue for a quota of reserved and allocated resources based on memory,storage and virtual machine templates.

In various embodiments, data driven UI extensibility capabilities may beprovided.

1. The user may define additional actions

-   -   a. The data center IT administrator (DCIT Admin), as part of        authoring the action XML, can define additional action(s) that        the end user can perform.    -   b. As part of authoring, the DCIT Admin may define tasks for new        actions and a UI name for the action.    -   c. When the end-user selects a virtual machine to perform any        actions, the UI may read the action XML and display and execute        new actions based on the action XML associated with the virtual        machine.

2. Allow the user to define run time parameters for actions

-   -   a. The DCIT Admin, as part of authoring the action XML, can        define additional runtime parameters (key value pair) and the UI        name for the key for the actions.    -   b. The DCIT Admin can additionally define default values to the        key and bind these parameters to the scripts that define the        tasks.    -   c. When the end-users select a virtual machine to perform any        actions, the UI may be extended to display these runtime key        value pair parameters with default values. The end-user can then        overwrite these values with user specific values which can be        added into the data item as part of the action execution.

In an embodiment, the user interface may provide the following userinterface components. A registration user interface may be provided thatthe BUIT uses to register their organization into the system. Anon-boarding user interface may be provided to request an initialallocation of their virtual environment or as a set of change requests.

A configuration user interface may be provided that the data centeradministrator may use to configure the data center allocation fordifferent BUITs, configure extensibility, configure the self-serviceportal branding/logo, and perform maintenance related tasks for thesystem itself. A provisioning user interface may be provided that thedata center administrator may use to provision an allocated system forthe requesting BUIT.

A role-based access control user interface may be provided for theadministrator to manage role based access to the system. Theself-service portal user interface may be provided for the BUIT toaccess the virtual environment that has been allocated by the datacenter administrator. Finally, an extensibility/authoring user interfacemay be provided for the data center administrator to add/remove/editvirtual machine actions and tasks associated with each virtual machineaction. This user interface may also be used to add/remove/edit scriptsand corresponding parameters associated with each task.

In various embodiments, an extensibility model may be provided at aplurality of levels. Users may be enabled to add/remove/modify virtualmachine actions. Each action may correspond to a virtual machinetemplate and associated actions. The configuration may be stored in anXML blob.

Another extensibility level may be expressed as tasks. Virtual machineactions may contain one or more tasks and a user may add/remove/modifytasks for each virtual machine action. Each task may result in oneworkflow activity.

Yet another extensibility level may be expressed as scripts. Forexample, each task may be associated with one PS script and one or moreof the following properties.

Continue on Error—This property can have a value of true or false. Ifset to true, any script errors including timeout errors may beconsidered non-fatal and workflow execution may continue in spite of theerror. If set to false, any error (be it script or timeout) may beconsidered a terminal error and the workflow may be aborted. In oneembodiment this value may be assigned a default value of false (toterminate workflow on error).

Success Code List—This may be a list of known success codes that ascript can output. In one embodiment, this may be an optional parameter.If not specified, the script return code evaluation can be ignored. Itmay be assumed that the script succeeded unless an exception was raised.Multiple success codes may be separated by a comma separating them. Inorder to evaluate the output from a script, only the first return valuefrom the pipeline may be considered (script evaluations may be performedusing Power Shell). If a script returns multiple values, all except thefirst return value may be ignored.

Parameter—This may be an input parameter to a task. A type need not bespecified as part of the parameter because ultimately everything will bepassed in as a string unless the input parameter being referred to is anoutput from a previous task. If the current input parameter is an outputfrom a previous task, then whatever its type, it may be directly addedas a parameter. A parameter may have a name and a value. The value maybe the value of the parameter node but not an attribute on the parameternode. A parameter can be defined in one of three ways:

A constant—this can be a literal or a hard coded value.

An XPath expression—this can be a placeholder that is replaced with anactual value at runtime.

Output from a previous task—this may be a placeholder that is replacedwith an actual value at runtime.

Script Type—The system may support multiple script types and carry outscript execution using scripting languages such as Power Shell.Supported script types may include but not limited to Command Script, VBScript, and Power Shell Script.

Script Body—The script content may be copied and pasted into a field.

Locked Script Body—This is a section in which the script content may becalled in a lock.

SnapIns—This parameter may be provided if the Script Type is set toPower Shell Script.

IsEnabled—This parameter may take a Boolean value (true/false). Duringdesign/authoring time, the user may determine whether a specific taskshould be enabled or disabled. This can be done through theconfiguration user interface if implemented or directly in notepad (XMLhandling).

TimeoutSeconds—If this value is not set, the task may be treated as anasynchronous task and not terminated at all. However, the workflowinstance may be terminated after workflow timeout has occurred.

In one embodiment the data item schema may be as follows.

 <?xml version=“1.0” encoding=“utf-8” ?> - <DataItem> -<Configuration> - <DataCenter>  <ID />  <Name />  <DCITAdmin /> </DataCenter> - <VMMServer>  <ID />  <FQDN />  </VMMServer> -<BusinessUnit>  <ID />  <UnitCode />  <DisplayName />  <BUITAdmin /> </BusinessUnit> - <Infrastructure>  <ID />  <Name /> <ForecastedMemoryQuotaInGB />  <ForecastedStorageQuotaInGB /> <ForecastedDecommissionDate />  </Infrastructure> - <Service>  <ID /> <Name />  <AllocatedMemoryQuotaInGB />  <AllocatedStorageQuotaInGB /> <AvailableMemoryQuotaInGB />  <AvailableStorageQuotaInGB /> <ReservedMemoryQuotaInGB />  <ReservedStorageQuotaInGB /> <EnvironmentTypeID />  <EnvironmentTypeName />  <MemoryCostPerGBPerDay/>  <StorageCostPerGBPerDay />  <BillingCode />  <StoreInLibraryID /> <StoreInLibraryServer />  <StoreInLibraryShare /> - <HostGroup>  <ID /> <HostGroupGuid />  <HostGroupName />  </HostGroup> - <SAN>  <ID /> <Name />  <DeviceID />  </SAN>  </Service> - <ServiceRole>  <ID /> <Name />  </ServiceRole> - <Job>  <ID />  <JobGuid />  <SubmittedBy /> <SubmittedDate />  <TemplateID-Deprecated />  <JobIndex /> - <JobType> <ID />  <Name />  <AssemblyName />  <ClassName />  </JobType>  </Job> -<VMTemplate>  <ID />  <Guid />  <LibraryShareID />  <LibraryServerGuid/>  <LibraryShare />  <OS />  <RAM />  <Storage />  <CPU />  <CPUType /> <DisplayName />  <IsCustom />  <IsShared />  <CostPerDay /> </VMTemplate>  </Configuration> - <ActionData> - <VirtualMachine>  <ID/>  <Guid />  <Name />  <AllocatedMemoryQuota />  <AllocatedStorageQuota/> - <Network>  <VLANID />  <Name />  <HyperVNetworkName /> <IsVLANEnabled />  <IsStaticMAC />  <HighAvailability /> <IsDomainJoined />  <StartIPAddress />  <EndIPAddress /> - <IP> <IPAddress />  <DefaultGateWay />  <SubnetMask />  <MACAddress /> <IsIPStatic />  <DNSServer />  </IP> - <LoadBalancer>  <Name /> <DeviceId />  <Port />  <VIPPool />  </LoadBalancer>  </Network> -<Domain>  <ID />  <Name-Deprecated />  <FQDN />  </Domain> </VirtualMachine>  </ActionData>  <Output />  </DataItem>

In an embodiment, an actions XML schema may be as follows.

<?xml version=“1.0” encoding=“utf-8”?> <xs:schemaattributeFormDefault=“unqualified” elementFormDefault=“qualified”xmlns:xs=“http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema”>  <xs:elementname=“Actions”>   <xs:complexType>    <xs:sequence>     <xs:elementmaxOccurs=“unbounded” name=“Action”>      <xs:complexType>      <xs:sequence>        <xs:element name=“Task”>        <xs:complexType>          <xs:sequence>           <xs:elementname=“Parameters”>            <xs:complexType>             <xs:sequence>             <xs:element maxOccurs=“unbounded” name=“Parameter”>              <xs:complexType>                <xs:simpleContent>                <xs:extension base=“xs:string”>                 <xs:attribute name=“name” type=“xs:string”use=“required” />                 </xs:extension>               </xs:simpleContent>               </xs:complexType>             </xs:element>             </xs:sequence>           </xs:complexType>           </xs:element>          <xs:element name=“ScriptType” type=“xs:string” />          <xs:element name=“ScriptBody” type=“xs:string” />          <xs:element name=“LockScriptBody” type=“xs:string” />          <xs:element name=“SnapIns” />           <xs:elementname=“TimeoutSeconds” type=“xs:unsignedShort” />          </xs:sequence>         <xs:attribute name=“name” type=“xs:string” use=“required” />         <xs:attribute name=“description” type=“xs:string”use=“required” />          <xs:attribute name=“isEnabled”type=“xs:boolean” use=“required” />          <xs:attributename=“continueOnError” type=“xs:boolean” use=“required” />         <xs:attribute name=“successCodeList” type=“xs:unsignedByte”use=“required” />          <xs:attribute name=“ID” type=“xs:string”use=“required” />         </xs:complexType>        </xs:element>      </xs:sequence>       <xs:attribute name=“ID” type=“xs:string”use=“required” />       <xs:attribute name=“name” type=“xs:string”use=“required” />       <xs:attribute name=“description”type=“xs:string” use=“required” />      </xs:complexType>    </xs:element>    </xs:sequence>   </xs:complexType>  </xs:element></xs:schema>

FIG. 11 depicts an exemplary operational procedure for allocatingstorage, network and computing infrastructure as a virtualized computingenvironment to a plurality of user groups including operations 1100,1102, 1104, 1106, and 1108. Referring to FIG. 11, operation 1100 beginsthe operational procedure and operation 1102 illustrates configuringstorage, network, and computing information for use by the plurality ofuser groups. Operation 1104 illustrates receiving a request forvirtualized computing services from one of the plurality of user groups,the request including a request for allocation of a virtualizedcomputing environment. Operation 1106 illustrates conditionallyapproving the requested virtualized computing services based onavailable resources in the storage, network and computinginfrastructure. Operation 1108 illustrates allocating and assigningstorage, network, and computing infrastructure resources, wherein theallocated resources are sufficient to provide the requested virtualizedcomputing services.

FIG. 12 depicts an exemplary system for allocating storage, network andcomputing infrastructure as a virtualized computing environment to aplurality of user groups as described above. Referring to FIG. 12,system 1200 comprises a processor 1210 and memory 1220. Memory 1220further comprises computer instructions configured to allocate storage,network and computing infrastructure as a virtualized computingenvironment to a plurality of user groups. Block 1222 illustratesconfiguring storage, network, and computing information for use by theplurality of user groups. Block 1224 illustrates receiving a request forvirtualized computing services from one of the plurality of user groups,the request including a request for allocation of a virtualizedcomputing environment. Block 1226 illustrates conditionally approvingthe requested virtualized computing services based on availableresources in the storage, network and computing infrastructure. Block1228 illustrates allocating and assigning storage, network, andcomputing infrastructure resources, wherein the allocated resources aresufficient to provide the requested virtualized computing services.

Any of the above mentioned aspects can be implemented in methods,systems, computer readable media, or any type of manufacture. Forexample, a computer readable medium can store thereon computerexecutable instructions for allocating storage, network and computinginfrastructure as a virtualized computing environment to a plurality ofuser groups. Such media can comprise a first subset of instructions forconfiguring storage, network, and computing information for use by theplurality of user groups; a second subset of instructions for receivinga request for virtualized computing services from one of the pluralityof user groups, the request including a request for allocation of avirtualized computing environment; a third subset of instructions forconditionally approving the requested virtualized computing servicesbased on available resources in the storage, network and computinginfrastructure; and a fourth subset of instructions for allocating andassigning storage, network, and computing infrastructure resources,wherein the allocated resources are sufficient to provide the requestedvirtualized computing services. It will be appreciated by those skilledin the art that additional sets of instructions can be used to capturethe various other aspects disclosed herein, and that the two presentlydisclosed subsets of instructions can vary in detail per the presentdisclosure.

The foregoing detailed description has set forth various embodiments ofthe systems and/or processes via examples and/or operational diagrams.Insofar as such block diagrams, and/or examples contain one or morefunctions and/or operations, it will be understood by those within theart that each function and/or operation within such block diagrams, orexamples can be implemented, individually and/or collectively, by a widerange of hardware, software, firmware, or virtually any combinationthereof

It should be understood that the various techniques described herein maybe implemented in connection with hardware or software or, whereappropriate, with a combination of both. Thus, the methods and apparatusof the disclosure, or certain aspects or portions thereof, may take theform of program code (i.e., instructions) embodied in tangible media,such as floppy diskettes, CD-ROMs, hard drives, or any othermachine-readable storage medium wherein, when the program code is loadedinto and executed by a machine, such as a computer, the machine becomesan apparatus for practicing the disclosure. In the case of program codeexecution on programmable computers, the computing device generallyincludes a processor, a storage medium readable by the processor(including volatile and non-volatile memory and/or storage elements), atleast one input device, and at least one output device. One or moreprograms that may implement or utilize the processes described inconnection with the disclosure, e.g., through the use of an applicationprogramming interface (API), reusable controls, or the like. Suchprograms are preferably implemented in a high level procedural or objectoriented programming language to communicate with a computer system.However, the program(s) can be implemented in assembly or machinelanguage, if desired. In any case, the language may be a compiled orinterpreted language, and combined with hardware implementations.

While the invention has been particularly shown and described withreference to a preferred embodiment thereof, it will be understood bythose skilled in the art that various changes in form and detail may bemade without departing from the scope of the present invention as setforth in the following claims. Furthermore, although elements of theinvention may be described or claimed in the singular, the plural iscontemplated unless limitation to the singular is explicitly stated.

What is claimed:
 1. A method for allocating computing infrastructureoperated as a private virtualized computing environment to a pluralityof users, comprising: allowing access to the private virtualizedcomputing environment via one or more communications networks to aplurality of user groups of an organization; providing a user interfacefor registering a user group and submitting requests for virtualizedcomputing services, the private virtualized computing environmentinstantiated on a computing infrastructure of the organization, the usergroups belonging to the organization; receiving a request forvirtualized computing services from one of the plurality of user groups,the request including a request for allocation of a virtualizedcomputing environment; conditionally approving the requested virtualizedcomputing services based on available resources in the computinginfrastructure; and allocating and assigning computing infrastructureresources, wherein the allocated and assigned computing infrastructureresources are sufficient to provide the requested virtualized computingservices.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the user interface is aself-service portal configured to provide access to the requestedvirtualized computing services.
 3. The method of claim 2, furthercomprising allowing inflation or deflation of the allocated and assignedcomputing infrastructure resources via the self-service portal.
 4. Themethod of claim 1, wherein the private virtualized computing environmentprovides extensibility authoring for implementing virtual machineactions.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein the virtualized computingenvironment comprises a hierarchical relationship between the computinginfrastructure, virtualized computing services, service roles, andvirtual machines.
 6. The method of claim 1, further comprising brokeringexecution of tasks to provision the allocated and assigned computinginfrastructure resources.
 7. The method of claim 1, further comprisingdetermining that the request can be processed as a function of a numberof pending tasks in a message queue, a maximum number of jobs that thevirtualized computing environment is configured for, and a number ofjobs to be processed to execute the request.
 8. The method of claim 1,further comprising: queuing jobs to be processed in a message queue;retrieving a job from the message queue; creating instances of workflowtemplates based on the retrieved job; creating a workflow activity; andscheduling the instances for execution.
 9. The method of claim 8,further comprising: associating a virtual machine action with a workflowtemplate; generating tasks and configuration information for the virtualmachine action; and executing the tasks.
 10. The method of claim 1,further comprising exposing a portion of the computing infrastructure tothe plurality of user groups.
 11. The method of claim 1, wherein theuser interface implements dashboard reporting and chargeback reporting.12. A system for allocating computing infrastructure operated by anenterprise as a private virtualized computing environment to a pluralityof business units of the enterprise, comprising: a computing devicecomprising at least one processor; a memory communicatively coupled tosaid processor when said system is operational; said memory havingstored therein computer instructions that upon execution by the at leastone processor, at least cause the system to: allow access to the privatevirtualized computing environment via one or more communicationsnetworks to a plurality of user groups of an organization; provide auser interface for registering a user group and submitting requests forvirtualized computing services, the private virtualized computingenvironment instantiated on a computing infrastructure of theorganization, the user groups belonging to the organization; receive arequest for virtualized computing services from one of the plurality ofuser groups, the request including a request for allocation of avirtualized computing environment; conditionally approve the requestedvirtualized computing services based on available resources in thecomputing infrastructure; and allocate and assign computinginfrastructure resources, wherein the allocated and assigned computinginfrastructure resources are sufficient to provide the requestedvirtualized computing services.
 13. The system of claim 12, wherein theuser interface is a self-service portal configured to provide access tothe requested virtualized computing services.
 14. The system of claim12, further comprising computer instructions that upon execution by theat least one processor, at least cause the system to author andconfigure tasks that implement virtual machine actions.
 15. The systemof claim 12, wherein the user interface is configured to depict ahierarchical relationship between the computing infrastructure,virtualized computing services, service roles, and virtual machinesimplementing the virtualized computing environment.
 16. The system ofclaim 12, further comprising computer instructions that upon executionby the at least one processor, at least cause the system to brokerexecution of tasks to provision the allocated and assigned virtualizedinfrastructure.
 17. The system of claim 12, further comprising computerinstructions that upon execution by the at least one processor, at leastcause the system to determine that the request can be processed as afunction a number of pending tasks in a message queue, a maximum numberof jobs that the virtualized computing environment is configured for,and a number of jobs to be processed to execute the request.
 18. Acomputer readable storage medium storing thereon computer executableinstructions for allocating computing infrastructure operated by anenterprise as a private virtualized computing environment to a pluralityof business units of the enterprise, said instructions for: allowingaccess to the private virtualized computing environment via one or morecommunications networks to a plurality of user groups of anorganization; providing a user interface for registering a user groupand submitting requests for virtualized computing services, the privatevirtualized computing environment instantiated on a computinginfrastructure of the organization, the user groups belonging to theorganization; receiving a request for virtualized computing servicesfrom one of the plurality of user groups, the request including arequest for allocation of a virtualized computing environment;conditionally approving the requested virtualized computing servicesbased on available resources in the computing infrastructure; andallocating and assigning computing infrastructure resources, wherein theallocated and assigned computing infrastructure resources are sufficientto provide the requested virtualized computing services.
 19. Thecomputer readable storage medium of claim 18, further comprisinginstructions for brokering execution of tasks to provision the allocatedand assigned virtualized infrastructure.
 20. The computer readablestorage medium of claim 18, wherein said instructions for conditionallyapproving further comprise instructions for determining that the requestcan be processed as a function of a maximum number of jobs that thevirtualized computing environment is configured for and a number of jobsto be processed to execute the request.